I just got Netflix and graduated.... bad combination.

 

I was wondering if anyone had recommendations on films about cities. I'd be interested in documentaries and feature films. The film could be explicitly about a city or the city could just be an important backdrop. Historic or modern. They could be about art, culture, social movements, etc. It's an open arena!

 

I'm excited to hear everyone's suggestions and opinions!

Hmmmm .. I would recommend a lot of Martin Scorsese's earlier work .. like "Taxi Driver", etc. It's not necessarily about New York directly, but it's very authentic to that time period. The city definitely plays a huge part.

 

"Metropolis" is also supposed to be amazing. Never seen it myself in its entirety aside from short clips, but for what they were doing back then, it really was quite remarkable.

I think Ken Burns made a documentary mini-series about New York City. I haven't seen it yet, but if the quality is consistent with his other projects, then it should be worth checking out.

 

Far more interesting to me, though, is how cities are portrayed in fictional films. Here's a few favorites and classics:

 

Fritz Lang's Metropolis is a classic silent movie that portrays a futuristic dystopian city. Countless future movies owe their inspiration to this one.

 

Ridley Scott's Blade Runner is a must-see. Be sure to get the Director's Cut or the Final Cut; the original theatrical release is widely considered to be sub-par compared to the later editions.

 

Dark City by Alex Proyas and Terry Gilliam's Brazil are worth checking out. The former is one of my all-time favorites.

 

A bit closer to home and reality, Wonder Boys was filmed on location in Pittsburgh, and does a great job of capturing the vibe of the city.

 

For New York City, check out Taxi Driver, Midnight Cowboy, the Godfather trilogy, and anything by Woody Allen. Stanley Kubrick's Eyes Wide Shut has some great night scenes in Greenwich Village.

 

I've never been to Los Angeles yet, but I can't think of LA without thinking of LA Confidential, The Big Lebowski, and/or Pulb Ficton. (LA Confidential and Wonder Boys are by the same director.)

 

Any film by the Coen Brothers will almost certainly do an incredible job of capturing the spirit of a place, even if it's not a major city. In addition to The Big Lebowski, Fargo and No Country for Old Men are cinematic masterpieces.

 

That should get you started....

The Pawnbroker - depressing but a real look at cities in the mid-60s on the verge of the urban crisis.

 

The original Out-of-Towners with Jack Lemmon.

you want a movie in which a city plays a lead role? well, the movie that best typifies this would probably be City of God.

 

It takes place in the slums (favelas) of Rio De Janeiro and the city and culture is a massive influence.

 

It's a fantastic movie and should be on anyone's must see list.

Switching gears a bit: "Blues Brothers" may be cartoonish, but it actually showcases various parts of Chicago in an unvarnished way.

great topic -- go straight for the foreign cinema classics!

 

wim wenders der himmel uber berlin aka wings of desire is a beautiful movie about berlin, except that after the fall of the berlin wall its lost some of its poignancy. still, it looks great and nick cave is bonus.

 

 

for paris its got to be godard's a bout de souffle aka breathless.

 

 

for rome for post war it's rossellini's roma, citta aperta aka open city and for rome in it's better days see felllini's 8 1/2 and la dolce vita.

 

 

for nyc taxi driver is an obvious one, but if you want cute and touching over the cold hard city look for ray ashley and morris engels classic the little fugitive. it's an almost scriptless, warm-hearted family film about a little boy lost in classic era coney island.

 

 

those should keep ya busy!

 

 

 

 

 

 

If you have patiance: Koyaanisqatsi, Powaqqatsi, and Naqoyqatsi.  More so about humanity in general, but our cities are often a focal point of that.  The first one (Koyaanisqatsi) is the best of the series.

 

 

Also check out Scorcese's "Mean Streets."  Great atmosphere of NYC Little Italy during the Feast.  All red lights in the bar scenes. 

Also, the original "Shaft" is great for 1970's Harlem and Greenwich Village.

And don't forget the TV show Kojak.  Seasons 1 & 2 are on DVD and are great.

Some other well known city flicks: French Connection, Roman Holiday, Paris Je T'Aime

 

Unfortunately not available on DVD or video, but my favorite city movie: Jules Dassin's "Up Tight," with stunning late 1960s footage of Cleveland.  Come out on DVD, please!!!!

More New York: A Thousand Clowns. Mid-60s -- bon voyages for passenger trips across the pond are still big; urban decay setting in; views from modern skyscrapers; rush-hour pedestrian crush; sightseeing; biking in parks; walkup apartments. Jason Robards, Martin Balsam, Barbara Harris, Barry Gordon and others. One of my all-time favorite movies.

Blues Brothers (Chicago) was mentioned.  As was Roman Holiday (a very fine tour of historic Rome).  Here's some others:

 

- Woody Allen's "Manhattan" featuring NYC beautifully shot in black and white

- "Lost In Translation" featuring Tokyo with Bill Murray and Scarlett Johansson

- "Dirty Harry" cleaning up the streets of 1971 San Francisco

Manchester plays a key supporting role in "24 Hour Party People".

 

"Blues Brothers" may be cartoonish, but it actually showcases various parts of Chicago in an unvarnished way.

 

For an earlier Chicago, from the late 1940s, there's "Northside 777", shot on-location so you get to see the last of old, pre-postwar boom Chicago as a backdrop to this film noir police procedural.

 

For a more recent Chicago, the Wicker Park bohemia of the early 1990s, there is another crime drama: "Blink" (the celtic-rock band in that movie was a real band in the Chicago scene of that time and played through Dayton)

 

And, for Baltimore, there is "Tin Men" and "Avalon".

 

 

 

 

Speaking of Wicker Park bohemia (pre-yuppification), John Cusack's High Fidelity is worth a see, in addition to being a hilarious movie.

"Dark City" easily ranks as my favorite neo-noir movie. The photography and lighting design in that movie is superb. Also, it was revolutionary in editing, the fastest-paced editing ever seen in a Hollywood film at the time. Nearly every second there is a cut (more similar to the pace of music videos and commercials than traditional Hollywood films), but the film manages to avoid looking erratic. It actually flows rather smoothly.

 

See "Dark City." It's a landmark film and is a lot more influential than people give it credit for. "LA Confidential" is a masterpiece too, and you do really feel like you're transported back to 1950's LA.

 

Agreed about Dark City... In addition to the cinematography, it's fascinating how it portrays the fictional city as sort of a 1940's Metropolis-on-steroids, with more than a few elements of Blade Runner thrown in. Utterly mesmerizing. Also, the story is very moving, at least to me. Being stuck in NYC for the time being, I often think of my hometown of Fort Thomas as my own Shell Beach.

My favorite foreign ones that show cities and cultures...

 

Central Station starts in Rio and travels across Brazil.  Good scenes in the main train terminal in Rio and interesting cross section of smaller town culture...and is an excellent movie.  In Portugese, so make sure it is subtitled if you don't speak the language

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pwjsrfv9RrU

 

WayDowntown is a surreal movie that takes place in an un-named Canadian city where a bunch of young co-workers in an office make a bet to not go outside and see who can last the longest...since they all live in apartment buildings attached to a maze of shopping malls, underground tunnels and their office building they technically never have to be in outside air.

 

Y tu mama tambien.  Good shots in Mexico City and good scenes of small town Mexico

 

Not foreign, but Mondo New York is a good documentary that follows a woman around New York as she visits the underground performance art scene (late 80's) and other strange things that go on underground in NYC.  Not for the highly sensitive though.

Per my previous suggestion for "Lost In Translation" and Tokyo, I found a trailer for it.  Nice trailer...

 

 

 

...and seeing the great Bill Murray reminded me of two more city-centric movies featuring him.  I give you New York City as featured in Ghostbusters and Ghostbusters II.

 

 

Any Whit Stillman movie is great - Metropolitan, Barcelona, Last Days of Disco.

Although it’s just so-so as a crime drama, this is the most visually stunning film about New York ever (which spawned a tv series of the same name in the 60's) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Naked_City

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cUO-tnJWhas&hl=en&fs=1